Dealing with the Devil
by kingsquidly
Summary: Team 7 returns from a botched mission and the Hokage puts their entire team on probation for a month. But what's going to happen once the Hokage insists that Sakura, Naruto, and Sasuke receive extra training? And what's going to happen when Sasuke's evil older brother Itachi is forced to supervise their training? Chaos ensues. NON-MASSACRE
1. Prologue

It was a disastrous mission.

It was Team 7's first mission as newly minted jounins, and a simple scroll retrieval had gone completely awry and turned into a huge, bloody, mess. There were too many bodies, too many witnesses, and Uzumaki Naruto, Uchiha Sasuke, and Haruno Sakura barely managed to escape the fray, unfortunately with no scroll in hand. The three 18 year olds now stood in the Godaime Hokage's office, trailing mud and blood everywhere and wearing exhausted and guilty looks on their faces.

The Hokage was absolutely livid. "How the hell did this happen?" Tsunade's face was bright red, just as if she had drank a little too much of the sake that was stashed in a secret compartment in her desk.

The three teenagers stayed silent, trading glances. Sakura knew exactly how it had happened. They had been too arrogant, still on a high from passing their jounin exams less than two weeks ago. Naruto had rushed in without thinking, stealth completely forgotten in a scroll retrieval – _a_ _scroll retrieval – _mission, and Sasuke, not to be outdone by the blond loudmouth had streaked in afterwards. The dynamic duo didn't hear their female teammate's protests, and didn't see the ambush coming at them from behind. Luckily, the mercenaries that attacked them were low-level nin and Team 7 would have had no problem incapacitating a handful of them, but there were too many, and the three Konoha nin barely managed to escape.

Tsunade looked at each of them expectantly, her nostrils flaring with each breath. "Well?"

"Shishou, we—" Sakura started.

"Didn't think at all? Didn't come up with a strategy? Didn't do any reconnaissance?" Tsunade interrupted, slamming a palm down on her desk.

The three teenagers standing in front of her flinched involuntarily as all the items on her desk flew up, and crashed back down from the force of Tsunade's palm.

"This mission should have been easy for a team of your caliber, but clearly you're al too wrapped up in your own skills to give a rat's ass about teamwork. Now I've got witnesses of Konoha nin in a bloodbath that shouldn't have happened, the Fire Lord won't stop hounding me about a massacre on our own land, and a messy one at that, and do you know how difficult you've made this for me diplomatically?"

Sakura opened her mouth to protest, but decided against it. They were a fine team, they did work together, and the three of them fit seamlessly together during fights like a well-oiled machine. It was, however, the lack of strategic planning that was Team 7's downfall.

Naruto decided to speak up for Sakura. "But we do work well together, Baa-chan! We've always—"

"Don't call me Baa-chan!" Tsunade yelled, slamming her palm down again.

Naruto shut his mouth. The air in the Hokage's office was heavy with silence. Sasuke shifted his weight and the floorboards creaked, and Tsunade turned to glare at him.

There was suddenly a sharp rap on the door, and Tsunade finally looked away. "Enter!" she barked.

The door swung open silently and an ANBU walked in. He had a tiger's mask on, and the rest of identity was shrouded in a black, hooded cloak. "Hokage-sama, I have a report," a distinctly muffled male voice spoke from under the porcelain mask.

"Give me a minute," Tsunade said shortly, turning her attention back to the mud-splattered jounin team. "Team 7, you are officially taken off the active roster for a month as punishment for your failure in this mission."

Naruto's jaw dropped. "But Baa-chan!"

"Shut it, Naruto! I'm extremely disappointed in you three. You're jounin now, and you need to think before you just rush into everything! And you, Sakura, I thought I taught you better," Tsunade sighed heavily, sinking back into her seat.

Sakura hung her head in shame, blinking furiously at the sudden hotness that had welled behind her eyes. _I am not going to cry in front of shishou, my team, and an ANBU member. _

Tsunade looked at the three teens in front of her. "You'll receive instructions on how to proceed in the next month accordingly. Now get out of my office and get to the hospital; Sasuke, it looks like you have a few broken ribs. Dismissed," she finally spoke.

Team 7 turned without a word and trudged out, leaving behind a fresh new trail of mud, closing the door behind them with a soft bang. Tsunade sighed again, and finally turned to face the ANBU member waiting patiently in the corner of the room.

"Report, Uchiha."

Uchiha Itachi silently took of his tiger mask, his dark eyes sparkling with amusement at what had transpired beforehand in the room with his foolish brother and his teammates. His usually passive face was twisted into a devious smirk. Sasuke-chan would no doubt try to hide all of this from his family out of shame, but unfortunately for him, Itachi had conveniently made it back from his ANBU mission the same time Team 7 did. He was so very looking forward to how the next month was going to progress.

"Yes, Hokage-sama."

_Little brother, just wait until our parents hear about this. _


	2. Chapter 1

Sasuke hissed in pain and threw a sour look at his pink-haired teammate, who was hovering over his three fractured ribs.

"Serves you right," Sakura muttered vindictively, the green glow of chakra fading from her hands as she finished healing Sasuke. She sank back down onto the small stool next to Sasuke's hospital bed, exhaustion finally hitting her like a ton of bricks. All Sakura wanted to do was to go home, take a hot shower, and crawl into bed.

Naruto finally emerged from the adjoining bathroom to the hospital room, having managed to scrape away the worst of the mud. He sat down heavily next to Sakura.

"Well, now what?" the blond asked.

Sakura sighed. "I guess we'll have to wait for further instructions from Tsunade-sama. I wonder if I'm still allowed to work at the hospital even if I'm non-active."

"Whatever," Sasuke said, throwing his legs off the hospital bed so he could sit up properly. He leaned in closer to his teammates. "Listen, my family cannot find out about this, do you understand? My father will kill me. It's going to bring shame to the entire Uchiha clan, and he's never going to stop hounding me, especially about you two," he looked pointedly at Sakura and Naruto. They both nodded minutely, knowing that Sasuke had to move mountains to get his father to accept his teammates who did not come from as prestigious a background as the Uchihas did. "And my brother. Especially my brother. He's going to hold this over my head forever," Sasuke moaned.

"Stop being so dramatic," Sakura snapped. The usually stoic Sasuke always got overly emotional when it came to family drama. "What do you want us to do? Go on fake missions?"

Naruto stood up, declaring, "That's stupid. We'll just go back to Baa-chan and ask her to give us missions, maybe she'll change her mind after having some sake or something!"

Both Sakura and Sasuke reached out simultaneously to punch Naruto in the arm, and the blond flinched. "What?" he protested.

"Don't be stupid, dobe," Sasuke scowled as he finally stood up. "I'm going home. Remember you two, none of this happened, alright?"

* * *

><p>The Hokage had unfortunately sent Itachi on a solo-reconnaissance mission directly following his report, and he had to leave immediately. A few short days later, he finally returned to Konoha, a little exhausted.<p>

"Okaa-san, I'm home," he called as he stepped into the airy kitchen of the Uchiha main house. He was met with silence. Itachi quickly deduced that his mother must have gone to the market; her shopping bag was gone, as was the shopping list usually tacked to the fridge. He couldn't sense his father in the house either; the Uchiha patriarch was probably dealing with clan matters elsewhere. Itachi headed upstairs, his sharp ears picking up muted conversation from his brother's room.

Sasuke's bedroom door was shut, and Itachi recognized the chakra signatures of his foolish brother's two teammates. Their voices were hushed and they seemed to be deep in the midst of scheming something, so that they had completely missed Itachi's presence in the house. Itachi smirked and muted his own chakra signature completely; he couldn't pass up this golden opportunity to embarrass his brother in front of his friends. He silently crept up to Sasuke's door, and just as he was about to reach for the doorknob, it swung open violently from the inside and a blur of pink and red fell into his chest with a horrified squeak before he could move.

"I-Itachi-san!" Sasuke's female teammate, yelped in surprise. Her hands were pressed against his chest, and he automatically reached out to grip her waist and steady her balance. Itachi caught the faint scent of lavender from Sakura's hair, and he glanced down at the shorter girl too see her staring back at him in bewilderment.

"You can let go now, Sakura," Itachi stated, amused. Sakura blinked, and then turned bright red.

"R-right. I was just—uh—going to the bathroom," Sakura quickly retracted her hands from his chest, and stumbled away from Itachi and out of the room, avoiding eye contact with the elder Uchiha brother.

Sasuke glared at his brother. "Stop manhandling my teammates, aniki."

"Hello, little brother," Itachi said, "how was your first mission as jounin?" Itachi's smirk grew wider as Sasuke's cheeks suddenly tinged pink and Naruto spluttered in the corner.

"It was fine," Sasuke said shortly. He stood up and strode over to the door, refusing to make eye contact. "Leave, I need to discuss something with my team." He attempted to shut the door on his brother, but Itachi quickly stuck his hand out and stopped him.

"Really," Itachi almost drawled, "well congratulations then. You should take some time off after your first successful mission…maybe a month's vacation?"

Sasuke's eyes snapped upwards, and Itachi caught a spark of fear before Sasuke quickly rearranged his features to look pissed off. "Get out, aniki," he snapped, and quickly reached forward to grasp Sakura, who had returned from the bathroom, and drag her forcibly into the room.

Sasuke's bedroom door snapped shut behind the pink haired female, and Itachi felt a flare of chakra and was met with complete silence – Sasuke must have sealed off his entire room to make it soundproof. Itachi's smirk widened even further if it was possible; he was going to have fun teasing his brother and his silly teammates.

"He knows!" Sasuke hissed, pacing around his bedroom.

Sakura frowned. "Well, it's possible, he is an ANBU squad captain, you know, he probably has access to information like this…"

"He's definitely going to tell my parents!"

"Maybe he won't?" Naruto suggested unhelpfully.

"Of course he will, he's evil! And he lives to make me suffer," Sasuke snapped, and Naruto nodded in agreement.

"He's not _evil,_" Sakura protested.

"Yeah, you think that just because you think he's _sexy_," Naruto piped up.

"I do not!"

"You were totally feeling up his chest before—_Ooh, Itachi-san, you have such nice muscles, _ouch!" Naruto's voice went up an octave as he made kissy faces in the air, and Sakura cut him off with a hard smack to the head.

Sakura crossed her arms in defiance. Sure, maybe she did think that Uchiha Itachi was physically very attractive, or the finest male specimen that she had ever set her eyes on, and sure, maybe she had accidentally let that thought slip those few months ago when Team Seven got hopelessly drunk for Naruto's 18th birthday, but there was nothing wrong with admiring her teammate's hot older brother from afar. After all, they barely had contact with each other; Sakura only saw him fleetingly at the hospital or when she was at Sasuke's house, and he had never spoken more than two sentences to her before.

"Oh, shut up, Naruto. There's nothing wrong with thinking he's attractive," Saukra said, cheeks tinging pink. "A lot of people are attractive, like Kakashi, if he would take off his mask…Neji-san, Genma—"

Sasuke looked revolted. "Can we please stop discussing Itachi's looks and concentrate on the bigger problem here? How are we going to prevent him from telling my parents?" he said.

"Teme, we don't even know if he knows about it," Naruto said.

"He definitely knows," Sasuke muttered. "That's it, we need to blackmail him." He nodded, like he had just come up with the most brilliant strategy in the world.

Naruto grinned. "Hey, what if we put an eraser on his bedroom door like that one time we did with Kaka—"

Sakura cut him off with a heavy sigh as she stood up. "You two idiots," she reprimanded them rather fondly. "Anyway, I have to go meet with Tsunade-sama for training, don't do anything stupid while I'm gone. And Sasuke, get your panties out of a twist and stop making such a huge deal out of this."

Sasuke scowled.

* * *

><p>Sakura still felt a little embarrassed facing her mentor after the failed mission. She might physically be the weakest member of Team Seven, but she prided herself on being the most intelligent on her team. She was the one who kept her two boys out of trouble, she was the voice of reason, and she was the one who fixed all the problems. Quite literally speaking, since she was a medic-nin. Sakura was not weak at all; quite on the contrary, under Tsunade's strict tutelage she had become one of the most powerful kunoichi in the village and one of the finest medic-nin in the shinobi world. But her teammates <em>were<em> Uzumaki Naruto the Kyuubi container and Uchiha Sasuke, a Sharingan wielder, and it was tough keeping up with them, especially during Team 7's younger years.

"Shishou?" Sakura knocked twice and entered the large lab where she and Tsunade did all of their medical training. This was where she revived her first dead fish when she was 12 years old, and the place held a lot of memories for her.

Tsunade stood in the center of the lab, hands on her hips. "I'll be teaching you a new surgical technique today," Tsunade announced, cutting to the chase. "You've pretty much mastered knitting together torn muscle, ligaments, skin, and the larger organs, but we're going to focus on the more delicate parts of the human body. The brain, for example."

Sakura nodded, excited to absorb new knowledge and gain new skills.

"The technique is basically the same, but it requires much more chakra control. Remember, neurosurgery is extremely delicate and precise…let's start with some chakra exercises then…"

Four hours later, Sakura was exhausted and drained of chakra, but exhilarated at the same time. She had successfully managed her first brain surgery (on a pig's brain for practice) and removed a small tumor on the frontal lobe perfectly.

Tsunade observed the brain closely, nodded and stepped back. "Well done. I'm proud of you, Sakura," she stated, and her young student beamed with happiness. "We'll continue with this next time. But first, about your team."

Sakura felt her happiness drain away to be replaced with dread.

Tsunade sighed. "Look, I know what Team 7 is capable of. You guys have proved that to me, and the village, over and over again. The thing is, you're adults now. You no longer need Kakashi around as a jounin-sensei, telling you what to do and how to do it. You need to think about all of these things for yourselves. Kakashi taught you to look underneath the underneath. You need to do that now, and more. You are the jounin now, and you need to take on the responsibility of being one."

"Which is why I'm going to assign each one of you additional training. You all need more experience when it comes to taking on responsibility. I'm going on a diplomatic mission for a week starting tomorrow, and I'm going to take Shizune and Naruto with me. Sakura, I'm going to place you in charge of the hospital until I return. Additionally, I want you to take on genjutsu training with one of our genjutsu specialists. Sasuke will also be training with you for now, until Yamato returns from his mission. Both of you will report to Training Grounds 3 at 0600 hours tomorrow. Is that clear?" Tsunade said, looking expectantly at her protégé.

Sakura nodded, her mouth dry. She was going to be in charge of the hospital. The entire, Konoha Hospital. Granted, it was only for a week, but the heavy weight of responsibility was already sitting on her chest. So this was the kind of training that Tsunade was going to enforce on Team 7 over the course of one month. Not physical training to increase stamina and speed, or ninjutsu training to learn more techniques, but training an individual to think, strategize, and prioritize in certain situations. A diplomatic mission for Naruto would undoubtedly test the blond's patience and tact. It would be good for him, Sakura decided, especially if Tsunade was grooming Naruto to take over as the Rokudaime Hokage one day. Clearly, Tsunade had something in store for Sasuke and Yamato-sensei as well.

"Yes, shishou," Sakura responded. She quickly bid farewell and left the lab to find Sasuke to inform him of tomorrow's new training schedule.

It was near dinnertime, and Sasuke most predictably would be at the Uchiha manor. Sakura made her way across town towards the Uchiha Compound.

"Sakuraaaa-chan!" one of the sentries guarding the compound called out, waving enthusiastically.

Sakura recognized the familiar voice and broke out into a wide smile. "Shisui-san! You're on guard duty tonight?"

Shisui grinned. "Heh, nah, just covering for my buddy for a few minutes. He urgently needed to—ah—use the bathroom. Bad sushi," he patted his own stomach and pulled a face.

"Is he okay? If it's bad, I can prescribe him some stomach medicine to ease nausea," Sakura inquired, immediately slipping into medic mode.

Shisui laughed and reached out to ruffle Sakura's hair. "Nah, he'll be fine. You're so cute for caring though. Are you looking for my baby cousin? He's in the main house."

Sakura pulled away from Shisui's offending hand, straightening her hitai-ite. "Thanks!" she offered the older Uchiha a charming smile as she passed through the compound gates. Shisui was the only Uchiha she enjoyed conversing with, save for Uchiha Mikoto, Sasuke and Itachi's mother. Unlike all the other Uchiha Sakura knew, Shisui was friendly and sociable, and did not have trouble actually expressing human emotions.

Sakura sensed four presences gathered closely together in the kitchen of the main house, and decided to knock on the front door to be polite instead of scaling the wall and entering through Sasuke's open bedroom window as she usually did.

The door swung open before she could lift her hand however, and Sakura's mouth dropped in surprise.

"I-Itachi-san!"

Uchiha Itachi leaned against the doorframe, dressed casually in black shinobi pants and a loose black t-shirt. His hair was damp and tied back in his customary ponytail, and he wore a small smirk.

"Well, hello again, Sakura-san. We must stop meeting like this. What is it, twice in one day now? You should really start paying more attention to closed doors," he said slowly, amusement laced through his words.

Sakura blushed in embarrassment and averted her eyes. "Ah, uh, well, I was, uh, looking for Sasuke," she mumbled.

She finally looked up when Itachi didn't respond verbally. He crossed his arms and cocked one of his perfect eyebrows at her. Itachi was not moving, and he was not inviting her into the house. The redness in Sakura's cheeks grew more pronounced, and she mentally shook her head to clear it.

"Could you please let Sasuke know that he needs to be at Training Grounds 3 tomorrow at 0600 hours for genjutsu training?" she spoke boldly, staring at the bridge of Itachi's nose instead of his dark eyes. Those were just a bit too intense to take on directly…

Itachi inclined his head. "That is acceptable. I will pass on the message."

Sakura flashed him a warm smile, disarming Itachi for a second before he quickly rearranged his features to his usual expressionless face. She did not notice. "Thank you, Itachi-san!" she said cheerfully, and turned to leave.

"Sakura-san," Itachi suddenly spoke up. She paused, mid-step. "It would be wise to not eat breakfast tomorrow," he said with a mysterious smirk. "Goodnight."

And with that, the Uchiha heir closed the door to the house, leaving a shocked Sakura for the third time that day.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: <strong>And here is chapter one, officially! I'm still working on getting the chapters to be longer, so please bear with me! Thanks for reading; hope my first Itachi and Sakura story is turning out alright. As always, feel free to leave reviews!


	3. Chapter 2

_Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, only the plot bunnies in this particular story. _

* * *

><p><em>Beep! Beep! Beep! <em>

Sakura's alarm clock shrieked, startling the kunoichi awake. She groaned and started groping her bedside blindly, refusing to open her eyes. She sighed in relief as her hand finally found the "off" button, desperately holding onto the vestiges of wonderful sleep. It took a good amount of effort before she was finally able to roll out of bed and open the curtains.

Brilliant morning light flooded through the now open windows, illuminating her messy bedroom. Sakura yawned and rubbed her eyes. It was such a beautiful day today, and Sakura almost felt excited that she was going to spend the majority of it outdoors, soaking in the sunlight and feeling the breeze in her hair. The trepidation of training was still there however; it was not until late yesterday night after she had left the Uchiha compound that Sakura realized that she had no idea who was going to be supervising her and Sasuke today.

Sakura stumbled around her bedroom, pulling on her training outfit of a tan skirt, a red vest, and knee-high boots. "Gloves, gloves, gloves," she mumbled, flipping through the haphazard pile of clothes that rested at the feet of her bed. She was unfortunately not a morning person at all, unlike her dark-haired brooding teammate, who woke before the rooster every single morning without any prompting.

_I really need to clean my room,_ she noted to herself, as she did every single morning when she had trouble looking for things before heading out the door. The thing was, Sakura was always so tired at the end of the day, and she had no energy to even think about cleaning. It was always shower, meal, sleep, and get up the next morning again. Thus, Sakura's small apartment was unfortunately in a state of permanent disarray, with clothes that just couldn't seem to find their way into the closet and heavy medical books and scrolls stacked high on every single table surface you could find. She finally found her gloves hiding underneath a giant textbook on poisons on her desk, grabbed her kunai pouch and medical kit, wolfed down a protein bar and an apple, and left the apartment.

Sasuke was already waiting on Training Ground 3 when she arrived, five minutes before the required meeting time.

"Who's training with us?" Sasuke asked bluntly, forgoing any greeting.

"Good morning to you too," Sakura said sarcastically. She shrugged and toed the ground with her sandal. "It's probably Kurenai-sensei though."

"Well then, I am sorry to disappoint you," an all-too familiar voice cut into their conversation.

Sakura and Sasuke spun around to face Uchiha Itachi standing in the center of the field, dressed in all black and looking as cool as a cucumber in the morning breeze. Sakura was certain that if Uchihas had emotions, her teammate Sasuke's jaw would have dropped by now. Sakura's own heart started speeding when she realized just who she was about to spend the rest of her morning, and maybe many mornings after that with. Her stomach dropped, not in a pleasant way, and she swallowed hard.

"Shall we begin?" Itachi said, almost gleefully.

* * *

><p><em>"You've done good work, Uchiha," Tsunade told the young ANBU captain as she perused his latest reconnaissance report.<em>

_ Itachi inclined his head at her praise. "You've also been working pretty hard these past few months, so I've shifted your mission schedule around a bit. I'm giving you the next two weeks off—don't give me that look, Uchiha—but I want you to start doing specialized genjutsu training with a few jounin. As you know, we are severely lacking in shinobi who are trained in the arts of genjutsu, save for the Hyuuga and the Uchiha with their dojutsu, but we cannot rely solely on their kekkei genkai forever. We need more shinobi like Kurenai to round out our ranks. This is why I want you to start with my own student, Haruno Sakura." Tsunade spoke. "See how she responds, and build a training program from her. If Sakura does well, then we'll start implementing a wider training program for shinobi who show aptitude in genjutsu." _

_ Haruno Sakura, his brother's feisty pink-haired teammate. "I understand," Itachi said. "However, I believe it would be most useful to have another member participate in the training in the first week just to grasp the basics of what I'm planning." _

_ Tsunade crossed her arms. "Well Yamato isn't back yet and Sasuke is on probation…" she mused aloud, "you can take your brother then. There will be no conflict of interest?" _

_ Itachi nearly had to fight back a smirk. "No, of course not." _

_ It was like Christmas had come early for him. _

* * *

><p>"Nii-san? Are you serious? I don't need genjutsu training from you! Hell, I don't even need genjutsu training to begin with! I can see through all genjutsu!" Sasuke blurted out.<p>

"And yet, you seem to fail to see how your own arrogance blinds your abilities, little brother," Itachi spoke.

Sasuke flushed in anger.

"Don't you have important ANBU matters to attend to?" Sakura asked suspiciously.

Itachi turned his attention to the kunoichi. "I am merely doing what the Hokage has asked. Now, enough of this idle chit-chat. Let's begin," he said, and suddenly vanished in a murder of crows.

Sasuke and Sakura immediately shifted closer together in a defensive stance, their backs nearly pressing together. Sasuke had activated his Sharingan, and Sakura held her fists up, concentrating chakra in her fists in preparation.

Sasuke shifted minutely, his crimson gaze sweeping the empty field. He could feel his teammate's warm chakra swirling behind him, a comfortable reminder that she had his back in battle. The minutes passed by slowly.

"Sasuke-kun?" Sakura suddenly spoke. "I don't think he's here anymore…" she trailed off.

Sasuke blinked. "What are you talking about? He's probably hiding and watching somewhere. It's Itachi," he snapped. "He's a sadistic bastard and he'll wait until we drop our guard and then kill us and dump our bodies in the lake or something."

Sakura sighed and dropped her defensive stance. "Really now, Sasuke-kun, that's a bit dramatic isn't it?" She had her hands on her hips, and was gazing somewhere far off in the trees. "Anyway, I need to go soon. I have a lunch appointment with your mother."

Sasuke dropped his guard and turned to look incredulously at his teammate. "You have lunch with _who_?" he asked.

"I…well…am concerned about you, Sasuke-kun. You're always so tied up in these clan matters, and I want to talk to Mikoto-san about you, and what happened on that last mission. I think your parents deserve to know that we're all on probation," Sakura said heavily.

Sasuke's Sharingan started swirling dangerously. "You wouldn't Sakura," he all but growled. "You _promised_. You're my teammate!"

Sakura locked eyes with him, her emerald gaze watery with tears. "But Sasuke-kun, I'm just so worried about you…" She started turning, reading to leave the training grounds.

"What is wrong with you today?" Sasuke asked. "Sakura, come to your senses. I swear, I will physically restrain you if I have to! I'll fight you!"

Sakura stared at him, and starting forming the seals for a transportation jutsu. "I'm sorry, Sasuke-kun," she mouthed, and Sasuke sprang forward into action.

Unfortunately for Sasuke, he had missed two very vital things. First, that it was nowhere near close to lunchtime. And second, Sakura had stopped calling him "Sasuke-kun" when they were fifteen.

* * *

><p>The morning breeze played with Sakura's short pink hair as she stood in the center of the training field, expanding her senses to find Itachi. She couldn't locate him anywhere. What she did sense was Sasuke's chakra, which was swirling with anticipation beforehand, suddenly spike and it took all of Sakura's years of evasion training with Tsunade to throw herself backwards and out of Sasuke's reach.<p>

"What the fu—" Sakura exclaimed, skidding backwards and putting a good twenty meters between herself and her teammate.

Sasuke was glaring at her, Sharingan-red eyes bright with anger. He was going to attack her again. Sakura quickly reacted, slamming her foot into the ground with enough chakra to cause a mini-earthquake. The ground cracked, throwing up rock and debris, and Sasuke was knocked off balance for a second. Sakura took that second to hide amongst the debris, and it was also in that second she noticed something was off with Sasuke's chakra signature.

_Genjustsu, _she realized.

Sakura quickly assessed that she was not under the same genjutsu, and only Sasuke was suffering from it. She wondered what he was seeing that could possibly make him come after her like that, and be ignorant to the fact that what he was seeing was false. It was then she realized how skilled Uchiha Itachi was at weaving the subtle layers of genjutsu, so that he could even fool the Sharingan.

She needed to get close to Sasuke to break him out. Which was good, because close-combat was her specialty, however, Sasuke was also extremely fast. Way faster than Sakura. She made her move, darting behind the upturned earth of the training grounds and rushing towards Sasuke from the back. He sensed it and turned to receive her in a flurry of taijutsu movements.

Sakura gritted her teeth. Ten minutes later, Sakura was breathing heavily and she still hadn't managed to land a hit on her teammate. He was too quick, and his Sharingan aided him in seeing all of Sakura's movements. She didn't want to _hurt _him by using her brute force, she only needed to get close enough to him to disrupt his chakra. Sakura's mind started spinning. If she couldn't forcibly break him out…_where was Itachi? _

He had to be watching all of this. He had to be in the area. Which meant that if Sakura somehow started destroying the area, he would eventually have to show himself. With that in mind, she quickly created two clones to occupy Sasuke, and slammed another fist into the ground, shaking the battlefield once again. Then, she proceeded to rip a tree straight from its roots and swung it around in a giant arc, destroying a wide stretch of forest. _Come out, come out, wherever you are,_ Sakura thought rather evilly with her oversized weapon clutched in her arms.

From where he was hiding, Itachi swore silently to himself. He had to use a teleportation jutsu to get himself out of the trees and avoid being clubbed in the head with _another_ tree that Sakura was presently holding. He noticed that his foolish brother was engaging in battle with two of Sakura's clones, still trapped within Itachi's genjutsu.

_What is she doing? _Itachi wondered. Sakura was not paying much attention to Sasuke. Itachi was crouching in the bushes now, watching Sakura cause general havoc and destruction on the training field. _Ah,_ he realized, _she's looking for me. How clever._ Itachi knew he couldn't just let her destroy the training grounds completely –pretty much every single Konoha shinobi who trained here would be pretty pissed off. Something along the lines of "don't disturb the neighbors this early in the morning" also floated across his mind. He had to make an appearance soon if he wanted to stop her.

Sakura almost started dancing in victory when Itachi suddenly appeared in front of her, an unidentifiable emotion in his eyes.

"Cease your fighting," he spoke calmly. And then his eyes widened when Sakura swung her tree at him.

Any lesser nin would have probably screamed at a giant pine tree being flung like a kunai in his direction, but Itachi calmly used a substitution jutsu and merely reappeared in front of the pink-haired kunoichi again, frowning this time.

Sakura was standing with her hands clasped behind her back, blinking owlishly at Itachi. "You said cease," she said innocently.

Itachi blinked, and was momentarily taken aback. This pink-haired medic-nin was most certifiably insane. Somewhere else on the battlefield, Sasuke had finally broken out of his genjutsu when Itachi's concentration wavered in dealing with the troublesome kunoichi, and was very confused.

"That exercise was to test how quickly you could identify being trapped in a genjutsu," Itachi started to say slowly, "Obviously one of you got a little caught up in your vision," he smirked at his little brother, who was turning five very interesting shades of red.

Sakura heard Sasuke growl like a rabid dog before he launched himself at his older brother, screaming something incoherent along the lines of _the devil, knew all along. _

Itachi merely side-stepped him. "One more move and I really will tell Mother and Father, little brother," his smirk grew wider.

Sakura felt her blood turn to ice. So Sasuke was right. Itachi did know. And if their parents found out…Sasuke would definitely be locked in the compound for the rest of his life, training only with the Uchihas and being sucked into clan politics. Team Seven would be destroyed, and she couldn't let that happen.

"Stop it, Sasuke!" Sakura yelled, stomping her foot and creating a small crater. Sasuke turned towards her, realizing that she was being serious. "Why are you doing this?" Sakura directed her question to the elder Uchiha, "Can't you just take your sadistic mind games somewhere else and stop messing with our team? Sasuke's already under enough pressure as it is from your stupid clan, and you're not doing anything to help with that, you bastard!"

If Itachi could look shocked, he would have. It was almost adorable how she was defending his silly brother. She called him a bastard. How interesting.

Sasuke was mumbling "Don't, Sakura," quietly to his teammate, but the livid kunoichi was not having any of it. She grasped Sasuke by the arm, and started dragging him away.

"We're done with this training session," she almost spat at the elder Uchiha.

Itachi watched them go silently. Gone was the shy and flustered girl he was usually accustomed to seeing around the Uchiha main house and the hospital. This girl in front of him was a spitfire, a girl who was not afraid of him, and a girl who recklessly swung trees around to destroy training fields. His dark eyes glittered with faint amusement.

It was interesting.

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><p><strong>AN: <strong>Thanks for reading! As always, reviews are much appreciated. I still can't seem to get the hang of longer chapters but hopefully frequent updating makes up for that. Hehe.


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